30 MILES SOUTH OF EUREKA!

Brian indulged Rebekah with a song featuring a female artist,"Just Give Me a Reason"!  (That's the car news!  And Ben finally awoke, "happy! happy boy I hope!)  Everybody in the car knows the duet playing.  Annaliese memorizes everything, so does Grace.  We're at peace....

Wildflowers bloom along the embankment, yellow, hot pink, white.

Another female artist, "Keep that one one!" Johnny blurts out, one of his few requests...."Dumb Ways to Die" (about train safety around metros....an Australian song)

I'm marveling at the almost dry, wide rivers with rocky bottoms and steep sides...Clouds hang low over the mountains acting as a stage to giant christmas trees.  A cop as the temerity to sit and lurk after unsuspecting motorists, who have gotten up to 60mph for the first time in 150miles!!!  

A meadow with grazing horses zooms past my window. I feel like we'll be descending to the Pacific and Eureka soon.  We'll unfold ourselves and purchase milk, meat, and munchies for our two day sojourn into the Redwoods.

We've just passed over another dry river.  Do they call it a wash here too?

The pockets of redwoods have been replaced by flat meadows and rocky hills covered with low trees.

The back of the van is clamouring for "cold air".  Ben shouts, "NO! No cold air!" Who will win the battle?

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We're now 5 miles from the coast!  What a change in scenery over the course of 3 hours!  Altitude sickness to sea level!!  

Oh!  Brian is playing his third female artist.

Marshlands have appeared!  We're at the Pacific!!!!  Mountains, blue, loom on the right, scrubby christmas trees on the left! 

Here's the picture of us touching the "forbidden rock" in the Petrified Wood Forest!! (out of order in the blog, I know!)

Now don't you wish that I was still driving since you've been inundated with descriptions?  

Advice to you all:  come see our wonderful America!  Italy can't hold a candle to it!!